Sand Birds
by maxridefan1234
Summary: Clarus is back, and this time instead of bringing ninjas she's brought bird-kids with her! Well, bird-kids, a talking dog, and an ex-Eraser that is. Also, Star is back as well as our human friends to try and stop her. Part Two of Three.
1. Feathered Friends

_**Author's Note:**_** So here is Part 2 of this series!**

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know.**

Chapter One: Feathered Friends

Its been a whole year since the first of the ninjas had landed in the living room. We had now moved back to Kuwait and had moved back to our old house. My mom and dad had gone on vacation in Singapore. They left me and my younger sister, Calen, to stay at the house. Our neighbors and friends across the street Fatima,Ali,Hamad,Panda,and Aboss were to come and check up on us.

An origami cat I had made to look like my old friend Star hung from the light fixture in my room. A black origami angel hung beside it. I often sat on my bed wondering what Star had wanted to tell us before she had to go, but every time I came close to remembering something interrupts me and I forget again.

On one of the walls I had hung up a picture of a mouse I had drawn. Below the mouse hung a picture I had printed out of the Naruto characters that had visited the real world last year. Another picture of Star hung beside the mouse, to form and upside down triangle on the wall.

I still wondered what connected the three. The supposedly fictional characters, a very smart and strange cat, and a mouse that was said to have something to do with the Naruto characters coming here.

"Sammie!" I heard Calen call from downstairs. "Come here! You need to see this!"

I sighed and got out of bed. I went downstairs to find a sight that I thought I would never see. There, in the downstairs living room, stood six children ranging from the ages of six to fourteen, dressed in ripped and blood stained clothes. I quickly looked at each of them. A girl with long blonde hair and chocolate colored eyes, about fourteen-ish. Maximum (Max) Ride. A boy with black hair,dark eyes,and olive colored skin, around the same age as Max,with an expressionless face. Fang. Another boy with blonde hair and sightless eyes. Iggy. A girl around the age of eleven with cocoa-brown skin and dark brown hair. Nudge. A blonde haired blue-eyed boy around age eight. The Gasman (Gazzy). And finally, a girl with blonde hair and sister to Gazzy around age six. Angel.

I had six bird-kids standing in my living room. Almost the entire Flock, missing only Total the small Scottie dog.

"Where are we?" Nudge asked.

"Your in Kuwait." I said. The Flock turned to look at me, as if they had just noticed I was there.

"Where's that?" Gazzy asked.

"The Middle East." The Flock stared wide eyed at me. Max and Fang's eyes narrowed, they probably didn't trust me. I really can't blame them, what with growing up in a dog crate in a mad science lab.

OK, now for those of you who are completely lost and have no idea what the series of books (and more recently manga) they come from is, let me first say that the series is called Maximum Ride after the main character, Max. Max and her Flock are mutants created by the white-coats (scientists) that work at a place called the School. They are 98% human, and 2% bird. About four years ago they escaped from the School with the help of a white-coat named Jeb Batchelder. Jeb had disappeared two years after their escape, presumably dead.

Two years after Jeb's disappearance, human-wolf hybrids called Erasers found them and kidnapped Angel. The Flock eventually gets Angel back from the School and go to New York where they find Total. I'll explain other events later on when/if they are mentioned.

"Exactly how did we go from a vacation home in Colorado to the middle of a freakin' desert?" Max shouted. "And what happened to Ari and Total?" Ari is Max's half-brother, he's seven years old and was turned into and Eraser when he was three. The white-coats later patched wings onto him.

"Um, if it makes you guys feel any better you aren't the first to have appeared." they stared at me. "Some others had appeared last year, they're gone now, though."

"Exactly _how_ is that suppose to make us feel better?" Iggy asked.

"Because what ever brought them here eventually brought them back?" I suggested. "I don't know the specifics. Here, come with me to my room. I'll tell you everything that happened while the other people had been here, from beginning to end." I could see that they still didn't completely trust me, but I guess that they probably had Angel reading my mind, looking for any evil intent that I had. Which I didn't. And yes, Angel can read minds and even control them sometimes. She really starts becoming creepy later on in the series,well to me at least. The Flock members all have special powers of their own. You'll probably learn about those later, it depends on where on the MR time-line they are. I'm guessing since Max mentioned Ari traveling with them and that they had been in a vacation home, that they were somewhere in the third book.

The Flock followed me up to my room. I sat down on the bed and showed them the pictures that I had up on the wall. I then proceeded to tell them everything that had happened. By the time I had finished the Flock was silent, digesting this new information. I hadn't seen Calen, so I guess she left me to deal with them since the last time visitors from another world showed up I had left her to deal with the first of them.

"So..." I said. The Flock looked at me. "I guess I need to expand my mind-map thingy."

I then left to go to my sister's room, where the laptops and printer was located on two desks at the right-hand side of the room. I quickly got on the internet and printed out a picture of the Flock, as well as a picture of me,Calen,Aboss,and Panda that I had saved on my computer.

I went back to the Flock that I had left in my room. I moved the picture of the mouse towards the top-left hand area of the wall. I moved the picture of Star towards the top-right hand area. I put the picture of the Naruto characters on the bottom-left corner and the picture of the Flock on the bottom-right. I put the picture of me and my family/friends in the center.

"What's that for?" Nudge asked me.

"I made it a couple months ago. I'm trying to use it to make sense of why a bunch of people are starting to randomly appear at my house. As you can plainly see, I haven't actually done much with it yet."

"So your using it as a thing to help you figure out the connections between everything shown here?" Nudge asked.

"Pretty much."

"Anyway, so we're pretty much stuck here until whatever it was that brought us here brings us back?" Max asked. I think she's kinda started to trust me a little, but not much.

"Yup, and according to Star that has something to do with him or her." I said, pointing at my mouse picture.

"So your going to trust what a cat told you?" Max said. I hissed at her in response. "Whatever."

"Anyway, I have school tomorrow."

"Ooh! Can we go to school too?" Nudge asked.

"I don't think it would be wise for us to go to school, Nudge. I think you know why." Max told her. And so did I. The last school that they went to was one in Virginia. There they had stayed with someone who turned out to be a white-coat. Her name was Anne Walker and they had met her after Fang had to be taken to the hospital after Ari had injured him badly. Ari really hates Max and her Flock, but if they are at where I think they are on the MR time-line then he will have stopped all of that and turned good again.

Angel's eyes had widened a little. "How do you know about us going to school in Virginia?" she asked me. _Crap. I forgot that Angel could read minds._ The whole Flock visibly tensed.

"Well, uh. Perhaps it would be better if I just showed you." I told them. I might as well tell them, the cats out of the bag anyway. "Follow me."

As it turned out, I still had in my bag the fourth MR book. I walked out of my room and down the hall, towards the stairs. The Flock wasn't following me. They probably thought I was trying to lead them into a trap or something. Heck, if I knew Max like I thought I did (since the books are in her point of view) she probably had Angel reading my mind right now. I got the book out of my bag from downstairs and brought it back to my room where the Flock had waited for me. I handed it to Max.

Her eyes widened when she looked at the cover. "What is this?" she asked me.

"In this world, you guys are kinda a series of books. That's the fourth book." She handed book to Fang to look at. He flipped through the pages. He frowned.

"They're blank."

"What?" I said and pulled the book away from him to flip through the pages myself. "They aren't blank." I handed the book to Max again.

"So you pretty much know a lot about our lives then, huh?" Max said. They seemed to be taking the fact that they aren't suppose to even exist in this world pretty well. Scratch that, they weren't suppose to exist even in their world. In their world even mutant bird-kids aren't suppose to exist. They were just created by mad scientists.

"So," I said "anyone want something to eat?"


	2. Meet the Cats

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know.**

Chapter Two: Meet the Cats

The next day me,Calen,and the Flock ate breakfast at the kitchen table on the first floor. The Flock had decided to come with me and my sister to school. Using Angel's power to sometimes control other people's minds, this was easy to arrange. Because none of us were to keen on anyone other than those who already know about the visitors from other worlds knowing about the Flock being here, they would fly to school themselves.

"Come on, its time for us to go to school." I told everyone. The Flock headed upstairs where they would go to the third floor and out onto the roof. Me and Calen went out the front door and headed to Fatima's house. There we joined Panda and Aboss in the green van (Hamad was home sick).

On the way to school I told Panda about the Flock somehow finding their way into the real world. She didn't seem to thrilled about more unexpected visitors. However, Aboss looked like he couldn't wait to meet them. Especially when he heard about the youngest bird-kid Angel.

When I got to school I met up with Max, Fang, and Iggy – or as they were going by at school – Megan, Daniel, and Ian. I actually had them in a lot of my classes. Not all of them, but most.

**A-Day**

**A1:**_ Science_ – Max (Megan)

**B1: **_Social Studies_ – Iggy (Ian)

**L1:** _Lunch_ – All

**C1:** _Ceramics II_ – Iggy (Ian)

**D1:** _Spanish_ – None

**B-Day**

**A2: **_AFL_ – Fang (Daniel)

**B2: **_Girls PE_ – Max (Megan)

**L2: **_Lunch –_ All

**C2: **_Algebra I_ – None

**D2: **_LA_ – Fang (Daniel)

That morning I walked to Mrs. Assaf's room with Fang, I had failed AFL II again for either the second or third time. What? I can understand and speak more Arabic than I can read or write. The two of us were quiet as we reached the door. I pushed down on the handle. The door was locked, again. I should know by now that she never leaves the door open and often doesn't arrive to the classroom until a few minutes till class start. But it never hurts to check.

We sat down by the light brown brick wall. I immediately pulled out a book to read, while Fang just looked around the school, probably memorizing exits and windows like the Flock always does. Although its kind of a waste, considering the fact that the school has open hallways so pretty much the only areas that are _not_ open to the sky – the Flocks' favorite way of escape – is the actual classrooms.

"So," I said after awhile,trying to break the silence "You do know that unless what ever brought you guys here brings them here that your not going to be attacked by Erasers, Flyboys, or any other mutants or robots the white-coats create, right?"

Flyboys are robots with wings and a thin layer of Eraser skin on them, they are the Eraser's replacement once they became obsolete and were all "retired", as the white-coats put it. The only reason Ari is still alive at the point on the MR time-line they are currently at is because his expiration date is about to kick in so because he's Jeb's son they are waiting for that instead of killing him with all the other Erasers. Yup, you heard me correctly, Ari has a built-in expiration date. In fact, they all do, even the Flock. Poor seven-year old, his short life sucked big time. Wait, why am I referring to him as if he's already dead? According to the Flock he's still alive.

Fang didn't say anything in response. "I should have known you wouldn't answer me." I said before opening up the book again.

Next I went to PE with Max. We had started a basketball unit not long before the Flock came. Apparently Iggy had PE at the same time as us, because we found ourselves playing against the boys' PE class. Now I have to admit, despite being blind and probably having never played basketball before, Iggy was pretty good at it.

"Nothing but net, Ian!" one of the boys cried. How it is possible for a blind bird-kid to throw a basketball into the basket without hitting the rim multiple times in a row is beyond me.

"Over here!" Emily shouted at me. I threw her the ball and ran over to the basket we were suppose to score in. I grabbed the ball when it bounced off the backboard instead of going into the basket before anyone else could. I passed it to Max and she threw it in.

This continued on until class was over and we had to go to lunch. The boys had won thanks to Iggy's help, if he wasn't there we could have beaten them easily. Oh well, it just goes to show you; never doubt the power of a blind bird-kid. Especially one as awesome as Iggy. I personally think he's one of the best MR characters, I mean who doesn't love a blonde-haired blind part-bird bomb maniac? I wonder what would happen if he and Deidara ever met...

"Sammie!" Max brought me back to reality as I saw that we were completely surrounded by cats. Did I mention that I had made some new friends this year? Patches, Comet, and Rose were also among my stray cat friends. I petted all of them and sat down on the fake grass outside the small gym.

"Hi everyone!" I said to my kitty friends.

"Your friends with all these cats?" Max said as she looked at me, probably trying to decide if I was like one of those crazy cat-obsessed ladies you sometimes see one TV. The sad thing is, she's probably right.

"Yup!" I said, picking up one fire-colored cat with bright green eyes I had named Flame. I had named all of the cats, I had even helped Mr. Johnson to name Comet and Rose.

"Did you name any of them?" Iggy said, appearing beside me and trying to stroke the sand colored one that I had named Ginger. "Careful," I said as Ginger tried to bite him, "Ginger snaps."

"So that ones named Ginger?" Max asked.

"Nooo," I said "You know Dasher and Dancer, and Prancer and Vixen, Comet and Cupid, and Donner and Blitz-en." I said as I pointed to random cats, "But do you recall the most famous kitty-cat of all? Its Rudolph the pink-nosed kitty!" I said holding up a snow-white cat with a pink nose and sparkling blue eyes named Pearl. She meowed at being picked up so suddenly while the bird-kids looked at me like they thought I was crazy. Who knows? With all these ninjas and bird-kids appearing, can anyone really blame me if I go a little insane?

"No I'm just kidding, her name's Pearl. She's deaf." I said, they relaxed a little, seeing as I was kidding and not really a crazy cat-lady. "And as you know that's Ginger," I said, pointing to her, "that's Flame," I pointed to him. Iggy just looked bored, not being able to see which ones I was pointing to.

"What's this one's name?" Max asked as she picked up a light blue-gray cat with black eyes.

"That's Misty, and the other one over there who looks like a darker furred version of her is Azula, I think the two of them are sisters." I said as I pet Ginger. Apparently, I'm the only one she'll let pet her, anyone else who tries ends up with many scratch and bite marks all over them.

Max set Misty down as an energetic brown cat with a white belly,paws,and tail-tip came running up to Max and jumping and attempting to swat at her hair . "F-A-F-A-L-F-A-L-C-O-N! Lets go!" I clapped twice "Falcon!" I said and then picked up our school's kitty mascot Falcon to gaze into his chocolate colored eyes. "This is Falcon." I said as I set him down. "He's the school's unofficial kitty-version of our mascot, the falcon. And its pretty easy to see why." I said as Falcon started running back and forth between some people eating lunch behind us. The school had practically adopted him, as well as his eight other stray companions.

"And this is Leaf," I said picking up a light brown tom-cat with leaf-green eyes. "And this is Flower and Claw." I said pointing to a yellow-furred female with yellow eyes and a gray tom with darker gray stripes and black eyes. "I think Claw might be Comet and Rose's father." I told her as Claw went to greet Patches. "Now you've met everyone!" I shouted happily.

"We should get going." Max said as she started to walk away. Ginger reminded me of Max, the way she is always so untrusting of strangers and nice to those she likes. I said goodbye to the cats and ran after Max, the energetic Falcon running with me all the way. Iggy followed Max and me when he heard us leave, the deaf Pearl following him. And you know what? Pearl followed him the rest of the day, waiting outside of the classrooms for him and helped guide him throughout the very unfamiliar school the rest of the day. Iggy guiding her away from any trouble she couldn't hear behind her.


	3. The Truth

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know.**

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Three: The Truth

Later that day I went home to find a friend waiting in my room that I thought I would never see again. "Star!" I shouted as I ran to hug my kitty friend that was currently sitting on my bed.

"What is it?" Nudge asked as she came into my room, soon followed by the rest of the Flock. "Its a cat!" she said and came over to pet Star. "Her fur is so soft!"

Angel and Gazzy came over to pet her as well. "Wait, Star as in the Star that disappeared last year?" Max asked.

"Yup!" I told her happily as I continued to hug and pet Star.

_ Hello, Sammie. _I stopped when I heard a voice in my head. The voice belonged to someone female, and it had a distinct cat-like feel to it. _Holy shit I've now got a Voice too!_ I thought with alarm. Max has this mysterious voice inside her head that's not her own. She calls it the Voice. _No, its just me._ I looked down to see Star kitty-smiling at me. _Star how did you get inside my head and why are you only starting to do this now? _

"Sammie, Sammie, SAMMIE!" Max said, first softly but then getting louder the longer she had to keep repeating my name.

"Shh, Star's talking to me in my head." I said and then looked at Star for her to continue while everyone else just looked at me like I was crazy. Well, everyone except Angel that is. I guess she picked up on me and Star's conversation. She quickly told everyone that I am not (at the moment) insane.

_I never talked to you before in your head because I couldn't then._

_So you can now?_ I thought.

_Yes, and that's only because the white-coats most recent experiments did that_. I stopped petting her to look down into her ice-blue eyes.

_Are you telling me that you are from the same world as the Flock AND that your the white-coat's pet?_ I thought at her.

_Not really, I'm only pretending to be bringing Clarus back, I'm not really going to be bringing her back to the School. _

_ Who's Clarus?_

_ Clarus is the three-eyed mouse that's responsible for the ninjas' and bird-kid's appearance in your world._

_ A three-eyed mouse is behind all of this? That doesn't make any sense!_

_ Clarus, or Experiment # 5718, was part of a project involving giving people the ability to travel between worlds. Surprisingly, before testing on people they decided to test on mice. Clarus is one of the only successful ones. She escaped last year and came here into your world. She then decided it would be fun to send those ninjas here._

_ So your an experiment too? What were they experimenting with you on? Are you part cat and part dog? Or are you part fish? Ha ha that would make you a catfish!_ Star hit my cheek with her paw, giving me the kitty equivalent of a slap.

_This is serious! Clarus is causing not only your world but mine and all the other worlds trouble! Her antics could endanger many people,animals,and mutants alike in all the different worlds with what she is doing. We need to find and capture her so that we can try to convince her to stop as well as hide her from the white-coats! Do you know what they could do to everyone if they found a way to travel between worlds?_ I thought over that for a moment and shuddered at what could possibly happen if the white-coats found a way to travel between worlds.

_OK then Star, I'll help you find this Clarus. And by the way doesn't that mean Bright One in Latin?_

_ Yes it does, but act like you don't know that I'm from the, as you put it, Maximum Ride world. If Clarus doesn't know that you know what world she's from we might get away with her just thinking that we think she's just a regular mouse. We might be able to use that to our advantage somehow._

I nodded and turned back to the bird-kids. "Alright," I said, "Its time to update the mind-map!" I walked over to my mind-map on the wall and took out an index card, tape, string, and a pencil. I wrote on the index card "Both Manga" in one corner, "Anime/Manga that I watch/read" in another, "Series of books I read" in the third corner, and finally "From the same world" in the last. I then cut up the index card into four pieces and started taping the index cards on pieces of string running from one picture to the other. I taped a piece of string going from the Naruto picture to the picture of me and my friends/family that know they where here. I taped the "Anime/Manga that I watch/read" piece of the card on that string. I did the same with the "Both Manga" card between the MR and Naruto pictures. I taped the "From the same world" card between Clarus and Star's picture. Finally, I taped the last one between me/my family/my friends and the Flocks' picture.

"There." I said as I stepped back to survey my work."Some connections have been recorded for future generations!" I yelled.

"You know, some of those connections you could have come up with long before we came here." Max said.

"I know, but I was too lazy before and I should probably put this all on a giant poster board so that I can hide the mind-map when my parents come back, if we haven't solved this little mystery by then anyway." I said. _Angel, can you hear me? _

_ Uh, hello Sammie!_ I heard Angel in my head.

_ Angel can you tell the Flock about my conversation with Star, if you haven't already? But make sure they don't say anything about it out loud otherwise I guess this Clarus might hear us._ I thought at Angel.

_ OK Sammie!_

Now hopefully the Flock will be able to help me with finding this Clarus and all that. Until then, I just hoped that Clarus wouldn't be stupid enough to drop a bunch of Flyboys or dangerous mutants on us. Was Clarus going to send Total and Ari here as well? Those two must be wondering where the Flock is and why they suddenly disappeared. Oh well, Iggy's almost finished cooking dinner so I guess all of us should head back downstairs.

XxX

Clarus watched Sammie and the Flock the whole day. She hadn't meant to send _all_ of the Flock (minus Total and – if you count him as part of it – Ari) to this world. She had only meant to get Nudge and Angel at that moment and send them here one or two at a time. No matter, she was still excited to be so close to the mutants who had escaped the School and given her hope that she could also find out how to control her power and leave too. Clarus decided that after tomorrow she would send Ari here as well. She didn't like Ari that much. He'd tried to hurt the Flock and kill her heroes many times in the past. Since they are apparently a series of books in this world if Sammie didn't trust Ari she would send him back and maybe send some other mutants here.

This world was a paradise! There were no white-coats, no Schools, no Institutes, no Itex, and best of all, no Erasers! Here people didn't combine two or more species' DNA together to create mix-and-match mutants or animals who could talk or any of those other poor creatures that Clarus had seen at the School. Here the mutants could live almost completely without fear of being found by those bad men and women from her world. Sure sending the ninjas here had been fun, but now she was sending mutants just like her to an escaped experiment's paradise! Who cares if Max was meant to save their world? It was just full of bad people. Sure here is full of bad people too, but surely none of them are as bad as the ones in her world! The Apocalypse was coming to her world, and it would bring an end to all the bad people there. Then, the mutants who had been _made_ to survive it would, along with any remaining people, take over the planet and live in peace.

No matter how much Max and her Flock wanted to save their world, nothing could prevent Clarus from having most of the humans on that world destroyed just like they "retired" and "put down" her friends that she made in that hell-hole called the School.


	4. Fangirlishness

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know.**

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Four: Fangirlishness

The next day I woke up to the sound of the Flock and my sister running down the stairs towards the kitchen. I followed them and was soon met with the smell of eggs. Iggy must of made breakfast. I walked into the kitchen to take an omelet from Iggy and sit down at the table to eat with everyone else. I had always heard in the books that Iggy was a good cook despite being blind, but sitting here eating some of his cooking now, I've got to say it was probably some of the best food that I had ever tasted in my life.

"Iggy this is really good!" I said as I took another bite of my omelet. I looked over at Iggy where he was sitting diagonal from me. _Eep, he's looking at me..._

I swallowed the food I had in my mouth and started to panic a little bit, though I didn't show it. What you just heard folks is the fangirl side of me. From the moment the first of those Akatsuki members had appeared in the living room at Fatima's house I was able to keep fangirl me under control. Now, however, it seems like the fangirl part of me was trying to get out. My guests already think I'm partially insane as it is, I don't need them seeing me act like a fangirl! Even though I kinda am one...

_Uh, fangirl me you do know that he's blind, right? So he can't actually see us acting like a fangirl._

_ Ya, so? You know you like Iggy, admit it!_

_ Fangirl me, Angel is probably reading our mind right now and I don't want the Flock knowing that even though I usually act calm on the outside that I'm a crazy rabid fangirl on the inside, OK?_

_ You can try keeping me under control all you want, but eventually I will get out, you'll see..._

I looked over at Angel, hoping that she didn't just over hear my internal conversation with the fangirl part of me that I have been keeping under control so well for a while. She showed no sign of it so I relaxed a little. However, I will need to focus on keeping that part of me under lock and key, I don't think the Flock needs to suffer my fangirlishness. _Your an Iggy fangirl? _

_Crap _I thought as I looked back at Angel. She showed no sign to the rest of the Flock that she was talking to me.

_I thought you would have liked Fang if anyone._

_ Well, Fang's nice too but I like Iggy more. Besides, I'm a proud supporter of Fax, so I shall not try and tear those two apart!_

_Fax?_

_ Fang and Max. While I support them I am not a big fan of Niggy._

_ Niggy?_

_ Nudge and Iggy._

_ And why is that?_

_ Because Iggy is MINE! Mine, mine, mine! Crap, fangirl took over for a second..._

I saw Angel trying not to laugh out loud at that. Eventually, it was time to go to school so I walked with the Flock up onto the roof. There I watched them spread out their wings and disappear into the clouds. Fang flew side by side with Max. Fang's black wings touched Max's white,brown,and black wings on the down stroke because they were flying as close as you can get to someone while flying side by side. Nudge's tawny brown wings soon disappeared into the clouds along with Angel's white ones. Gazzy flew up to join his sister flying with his dark brown wings **(A/N: I know Gazzy and Iggy's wing colors aren't mentioned in the books, but this is how I always imagined their wings to look like)**. I watched Iggy the longest, with his dark gray wings flying high in the sky, enjoying the sensation of flying above the clouds with his Flock.

XxX

The Flock was flying high over Kuwait towards the school they were currently going to. Max often wondered why she decided to trust the – from what Angel was telling her – crazy cat-obsessed fangirl. Angel had decided not to tell any of the Flock members about Sammie's crush on Iggy. If that fangirl side of her was correct, they'd find out eventually. Angel still couldn't believe that there seemed to be several little voices in her head all belonging to Sammie. There was her fangirl side as well as many other sides that all seemed to be fighting for control in her head. Angel still couldn't believe that she managed to act somewhat normal with all the mini-wars going on in her head between sides. Angel got a headache just trying to keep track of those mini-wars because there were so many. Basically, the girl had several split personalities.

_Oh well,_ Angel thought, I'll just focus on school for now. _After all, she's not with Them_ (Them refers to the white-coats and their associates). The Flock soon arrived at where they were to land and from there walk the rest of the way to school.

XxX

Today was an A-day so I had Science with Max first period. Me, Fang, and Max stopped outside the small gym, which is my regular meeting place with my cat friends. We stayed there with the cats until it was time to go to class. Me and Max walked to our teacher Mr. Ortiz's room. When we got there I immediately started jumping up and down with excitement.

"What is it?" Max asked me.

"VOLLEYBALL!" I yelled and started running like the mad women that I am through the hallway. Max eventually caught me and dragged me back to the classroom. "You know that like it or not I'm going to try out for volleyball and you are trying out as well."

"Why me?" Max asked.

"Because I think you would make a great volleyball player. At least, I think you'd defiantly enjoy spiking a ball into those preppy volleyball players' faces at that one school..." I trailed off suggestively and suddenly I found myself being dragged to the sign up sheet.

Next I had Social Studies with Iggy. I walked with him and Pearl (she's apparently still following him) to Mr. Wilson's room. I kept glaring at Pearl, trying my best not to growl or hiss at her for following MY Iggy around school. Damn that fangirl part of me, I don't want to seem more insane than I really am...OK so I don't want them to know how insane I am.

I groaned, "I can't believe we have to write a poem! Its fucking SOCIAL STUDIES! Not LA!" I said as Mr. Wilson showed a picture of a castle on the whiteboard using the overhead-thingy hanging from the ceiling. "How's your poem coming along?" I asked Iggy, looking over at his worksheet where we were suppose to write it. There was nothing written on it and I mentally smacked myself for once again forgetting that he's blind and that he probably wouldn't write anything down on the paper because of it.

Luckily for me Pearl waited outside of the class otherwise I wouldn't of been able to focus. Wow, I'm getting jealous of a cat, does that make any sense to anyone? I thought not. Anyway, the class finally ended and we all went to lunch. We all went to the counselor's office to eat with my friends. Dominique, Hannah, Holly, and Zainab were already there. I should have turned back while I had the chance.


	5. Warrior Names and Apprentices

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. Also I don't own the Warrior cat series.**

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Five: Warrior Names and Apprentices

"Hello, Daniel!" Dominique said. Max gave her a death glare, lets just say that Max didn't enjoy Dominique trying to spend a lot of time with Fang. If Dominique noticed this, she didn't show it. "Are any of you trying out for volleyball?"

"Ya, me and Megan are!" I said happily. "Are you?"

"Yes, me and Zainab." Dominique said and then took a bite of her waffle. Who brings a plain waffle to lunch anyway? If your going to eat a waffle for lunch you've got to at least eat it smothered with peanut butter!

I took out my lunch and looked over at Iggy. Max and Fang were sitting next to each other on one of the couches with Zainab. Max continued to give Dominique death glares when ever she looked at Fang. She eventually stopped and finished her lunch. Pearl was sitting on the ground next to me, apparently Mrs. Mitchell let her come inside. She eventually left though to go back to our kitty friends.

"I've got it!" Dominique said. "I, Sugarstar, leader of DesertClan, call upon my warrior ancestors to look down on this apprentice."

"Oh, God..." I said, realizing what Dominique was doing. I hit my head on the table and didn't sit up again while the three eldest Flock members just watched what was happening.

"She has trained hard to understand the ways of your noble code, and I commend her to you as a warrior in her turn. Silentpaw, do you promise to uphold the warrior code and to protect and defend your clan even at the cost of your life?" she stopped her little speech to look at me.

"Why must you do this to me..."

"Then by the powers of StarClan I give you your warrior name, Silentpaw, from this moment on you shall be known as Silentstep. StarClan honors your wisdom and your courage and we welcome you as a full warrior of DesertClan." she placed her hand on my head which was still on the table and I pushed it off.

"Silentstep! Silentstep!" my friends chanted.

"Uh, what just happened?" Iggy asked.

"I made Silentpaw a warrior and now her name is Silentstep!" Dominique said happily. "Congratulations Littlestream on your first apprentice finally becoming a warrior!" she said to Hannah.

"I'm confused." Max said. I decided to explain the situation to them.

"You guys know the Warrior cat series?" I asked them, still having my head on the table.

"I think I've heard of it before." Iggy said.

"Well because of my love of cats as well as my little group of cat friends they decided to start a clan called DesertClan to tease me. Dominique is the leader Sugarstar, and Hannah is a warrior Littlestream. Zainab is the deputy Amberwing, Holly is an apprentice named Sagepaw, and finally I was an apprentice named Silentpaw, now a warrior named Silentstep." I finally removed my head from the table.

"I almost forgot!" Dominique suddenly shouted. "You guys can join too if you want!"

"I don't think that's –" Max started to say.

"Amberwing, you are ready for an apprentice, you will be Darkpaw's mentor." she said pointing to Fang, "I know you will pass on your strength and cunning to Darkpaw, and teach him the skills that will make him a brave warrior of DesertClan." now it was the Flock members turn to face-palm,cover their faces because of all the people that had come to watch the show, and hit their head on the table as well.

"Silentstep, you are also ready for an apprentice, you will be Blindpaw's mentor." she pointed to Iggy, and I think I might have blushed slightly, "I know you will pass on your wisdom and courage to Blindpaw, and teach him the skills that will make him a brave warrior of DesertClan." Dominique finally turned to Max. I pity the poor bird-kids. "And finally, I, Sugarstar, will be Softpaw's mentor. I will pass on my bravery and awesome volleyball skills to her, and teach her the skills that will make her a brave warrior of DesertClan."

By now if it were possible for people to die of embarrassment then it would have happened to the renamed Darkpaw,Blindpaw, and Softpaw. Still, I chanted the new "apprentices" names along with the rest of my friends and random assembled 6th,7th, and 8th graders. Hey, I had to go through the same thing so they must also suffer! I tried to keep myself from laughing when it sunk in that Max's new name – to this group of students at least – was Softpaw. Now Max is not weak so I can imagine she must be fuming on the inside.

It also sunk in that Iggy was now my apprentice. That didn't exactly mean anything here. All it meant was that you remained an apprentice for at least a day and then after that depending on how long it takes Dominique to come up with a warrior name for you you might be made a warrior tomorrow. We are such a strange group. Anyway, now that the laughter had somewhat subsided we went back to talking about other things, continuing to use the cat-names.

Next I had Ceramics II with Iggy. We walked to Mrs. Ostaler's class. When we got there I sat down next to Iggy at one of the tables. Pearl had apparently decided to stop following Iggy whenever the next class he has is with me. That just meant that I got to spend more time with him without the Flock or kitty-cats around. I just really hope I can keep my inner fangirl under control...

Anyway, the rest of the day went by very quickly. Soon all of us were back home and out on the roof, where we had decided to attack the Clarus problem as there are few places for even a mouse to hide from us up there and not be seen. I looked out at everyone. Max was sitting across from me next to Fang and Iggy sat on her other side. Gazzy and Angel sat next to Iggy while Nudge and my sister sat next to Fang, forming an almost-perfect circle. Star sat on my lap.

_Now,_ Star started the meeting in our heads, for we didn't want to risk a certain three-eyed mouse overhearing us, _we need to find a way to capture Clarus without killing her_. We all thought for a moment, wondering how we were going to outsmart a most likely a-whole-lot-smarter-than-it-should-be mouse.

Normal mouse traps would obviously not work. I don't think she would try and take cheese or any other kind of bait from the regular classic mouse traps. Maybe we could possibly get away with those electric mouse traps. Na, I don't think she'd fall for that from what Star says, especially if she has been following us everywhere. Not to mention that it would kill her. Or maybe Iggy and Gazzy can come up with an extremely complicated one that would require a lot of tape,rubber bands,rope,cheese,paper clips, and other random items that might end up being to complicated and not work because of some mistake we made. No, we'll have to think of something else.

This is going to be one long night of plotting.

XxX

Clarus watched the group from her hiding spot in a mouse-sized place where a chunk of the wall was missing for whatever reason. Clarus had rolled around in some of the dark soil from the potted plants inside the house so that now she blended in perfectly with the cover of the night-time darkness. She was here for two reasons. Her number one reason being that she wanted to spy on their meeting and make sure that she is ready for any traps they set up to catch her. Her second being that it was time for a certain Eraser who happens to be the last one left to pay this world a little visit.


	6. Baseball Bats and Toppings

_**Author's Note:**_** Check out the new poll on my profile. I want to know who your favorite OC from this story is :)**

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. **

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Six: Baseball Bats and Toppings

We were all still in the middle of thinking about how to catch Clarus when a bright swirling blue and white portal opened overhead. We all immediately jumped up and out of the way of the two figures that fell threw. On was covered in black fur with a small Scottie-like body. The other was pretty big despite the fact that he's only seven. He was in a partially transformed state, like he always is. He sat up and put a clawed hand on his head, it probably hurt a lot considering that he fell on it.

"Ari and Total are finally here!" I shouted as Total the talking dog stood up.

"Where are we? This isn't Colorado!" Total said.

"Hi and welcome to Kuwait, home of sand storms and camels! I'm Sammie, this is Star,and this is my sister Calen Mae!" I said as I pointed to each one of them. "You are currently in a parallel universe where you guys are nothing but a series of books."

Total and Ari just stared at me. Then they finally noticed the rest of the Flock.

"Is this where you've been the past week or so? Stuck here with a nut-job, her sister,and a cat? Not even a talking one at that." Total said as he stared at Star.

_I believe that you'll find even though I can't talk out loud like you can, my obnoxious canine companion, that I can still speak in your head._

Total literally jumped ten feet in the air when he heard Star's voice in his as well as the rest of ours heads. Did I forget to mention that he can jump really high? Ari just looked up at the night sky, where the full moon shown brightly like a giant glowing potato chip. Fang looked at Ari wearily, as if expecting him to start attacking them at any moment.

"Fang, don't worry. I'm not going to let you guys get into any fights, OK?" I said, even though I knew that Ari wouldn't do that. Fang just looked at me but nodded apparently trusting me enough to know how to keep Ari under control. "Alright then, I guess we should all go inside and get some sleep. Tomorrow's the weekend and I'd like to take you all sightseeing." I told them.

"Ooh! Can we go to the mall?" Nudge asked.

Normally I would have said no, considering the fact that I hate shopping. But then I thought that these are probably the only of my inter-dimensional travelers that I actually _can_ take outside to places like the mall without them being easily recognized (surprisingly not looking like the manga versions of them) or possibly destroying the place.

"Sure! We can go watch a movie and get Pinkberry!" I shouted. "Hurray for frozen yogurt!"

So sure enough, the next day the Flock, me, Calen, Star, Total, Panda, and Ari went to the Avenues mall. We went to the movie theater first where we all decided on a movie to watch. Thanks to Angel, no one paid any mind to a talking dog, partially transformed Eraser, and a cat with a weird star-shaped mark over her left eye.

After the movie we stopped at Pinkberry to get frozen yogurt. I got pomegranate while the rest of the Flock got either the same as me, original, mango, passion fruit, or coconut. The entire Flock's and Panda's yogurt was piled high with toppings while mine, Calen's, and Ari's had none.

"Why do people get toppings on frozen yogurt? It takes away from the taste of the actual yogurt-y goodness!" I asked as I took another bite of my yogurt.

"I really don't know..." Calen said as she looked around at the surrounding tables to find us being the only ones who had no toppings what-so-ever while Ari just shrugged.

"But the toppings are really good too!" Nudge said.

"Ya, but still, the toppings take away from the taste of the yogurt." I told her.

"I'm with toppings." Panda said.

"Ditto!" Angel said.

"Down with yogurt toppings!" I shouted, earning several glances from passing people. "Come on Calen, help me out here, you don't like toppings on frozen yogurt either."

"I'd rather not get into a fight about having toppings on frozen yogurt."

"Ari?" I asked him. Ari just looked at me, like he thought he didn't deserve a say in even a fight as stupid as this one, but in the end I got him to admit that he was in fact against frozen yogurt toppings as well.

We continued this conversation of Toppings VS No Toppings for a while longer until we all finally finished our yogurt. After that we continued to walk around the mall. At least, until we ended up with a group of guys around me and Max's age following us. Eventually I got tired of them following us and marched right up to them.

"You know," I said slowly, "I keep an aluminum baseball bat in the trunk of the car me and my friends took here."

"She really does you know, she had threatened to hit me with it earlier today." Max said, backing me up even though I hadn't threatened her with my Baseball Bat Of Doom.

That scared them. They left us alone after that, however I remember seeing them around the mall a few more times talking to other groups of guys and probably warning them about the Crazy-American-Lady-With-An-Aluminum-Baseball-Bat. That sums me up perfectly. Well, they are missing the Cat-Obsessed part. Panda, Calen, and Total had left to go stay by the car and wait for us there, having gotten tired of walking around the mall.

Anyway, we had eventually walked around just about the entire mall when who should we bump into but my arch nemesis Sawda and her friends Bahi and Rasika. I stopped walking and glared in their direction. The Flock saw this and followed my gaze to the three friends who go to our school. Despite this, I rarely cross paths with them at school for they tend to try and stay away from me there where I have my feline friends with their sharp teeth and battle-ready claws.

Here, however, I didn't have them to back me up. While I had the Flock with me, I didn't really want them to get involved. I wouldn't even let my kitty friends get involved, however it didn't hurt to have them think otherwise.

Sawda spotted us and came over with Bahi,Rasika,and several others that I don't know trailing after her like lost puppies. Star was giving them the kitty-equivalent of a glare along with the rest of us. Now, your probably wondering how we ended up being arch nemesis's. Well, it actually started with what is probably one of the most stupid fights in the history of stupid fights.

It started back in 6th grade. It was the end of the year and we had final exams. I was sitting outside one of the classrooms in the 8th grade hallway on a bench reading a book. No one else was in the hallway except for me. Then, Sawda and a few other 8th graders who weren't even supposed to be in the hallway came and started demanding that I "be a good little sixth grader" and get off the bench.

Long story short, I just ignored them and after that they started using force to get me off. Now, I was one of the tallest people in my grade, almost taller than them actually, so I did pretty well despite the fact that it was three – later four – against one. The worst I got was a badly hurt shoulder while I'm sure they were nursing sneaker-sized-and-shaped bruises all over their arms,stomachs, and legs form when they tried to pull me off the bench by my legs.

They weren't even supposed to be there! They were all suppose to be on the other side of the school near the Auditorium. Anyway, let me tell you, me and my family were pissed. Not only did they get away with it, but it turns out that Rasika is the middle school principle's daughter! I mean, they all got away with it because she was Mr. Brown's daughter even though other principles wouldn't do that.

Anyway, enough of the past and back to the present. Sawda and her gang were making their way over to us. Her cold, dark eyes where locked onto us. I could feel the start of a growl in the back of my throat and I swear if I had retractable claws like a cat they would have unsheathed themselves by now. Wow, sometimes I can't believe how cat-like I am. I must have been a cat in a past life or something.

"Blindpaw,Softpaw,Darkpaw, let me take care of this." I told them. "That goes for you too Oceankit, Smokekit, Wolfkit, and Frostkit" I said addressing Angel, Gazzy, Ari, and Nudge by the kitty-names that I had come up with for them. I only use those names either at school with friends or about to go into battle with an enemy. The Flock knew this and we all prepared for our meeting with Sawda's group.


	7. TKOA and Weird Al

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. I am not The Key Of Awesome or Weird Al, so I don't own any of the songs mentioned by those people. **

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Seven: TKOA and Weird Al

Sawda and her gang eventually arrived at where we all where. I glared at them all as well as the Flock. "Hello, _bitch_." I greeted Sawda and her gang. "Its been several months since the last time I saw you. Were you busy hiding from me those last few months?" I asked her.

Last time me and her had gotten into a fight was out in a parking lot a ways off from school. There also happened to be where my kitty friends hang out when they aren't at the school. When we started fighting not only with words but with fists as well they all stepped in despite the fact that I told them not to and helped me to drive them all off.

Sawda just glared at me before her eyes wandered over behind me, where the Flock was currently standing. Thank God for Angel's mind reading/controlling powers otherwise bringing Ari with us would never had been possible in the first place.

"Who are they? Don't tell me those stupid cat friends of yours have turned into people."

"These," I said, gesturing to the Flock, "are the new students at school. And yes, they are my friends."

"To bad, _Samantha_," she said and I growled at being called Samantha, I didn't like being called that to much. "I think you would rather enjoy those stupid cats being turned into people, or would you rather have been turned into a cat yourself?"

"That's Silentstep to you." I said, ignoring her last comment.

She ignored me and looked at Max, Fang, and Iggy. "You three," she said, "what are your names?"

"I'm Softpaw, that's Darkpaw and he's Blindpaw, but you, bitch, better leave now before you find yourself walking home with a limp."

"Your blind?" Bahi, the biggest idiot of them all, said as she walked up to Iggy and started waving her hand in front of his eyes, as if that would prove if he was really blind or not.

"Eep!" she yelled when Iggy grabbed her wrist and glared at her. Bahi tore away from him and shrunk back behind Rasika.

"I may be blind," Iggy started, "but that does not mean that I can't take care of myself."

"Your actually kind of cute." Rasika said. "I hope you don't mind if I date him, Sawda."

I glared at her. "Keep. Away. From. My. Friends." I started growling despite trying to stop myself.

Rasika backed off, she was obviously afraid of me. Most of them were. They all thought I was a crazy-cat-obsessed-lunatic that belonged in an insane asylum. Although, can anyone really blame them? It is true. While the Naruto characters had been here I had been able to keep myself from acting like the loony I am, however this year I've started acting like I have been on the inside all along. Not the quiet, shy girl I had pretended to be while they were there, just for the sake of their sanity.

The longer Sawda and her group stayed there talking to me, the farther away her group keeps backing up in an attempt to get away from me and my weirdness. Eventually Sawda finds herself standing alone with the rest of her group a yard or two behind her. After seeing that her friends were a little, no, very scared of me since the incident with the cats they all left, leaving us alone.

After they left we went home and I immediately ran to my sister's room, where we keep the laptops. I opened up the internet and went to one of my most favorite websites, YouTube. I typed in the search box "White and Nerdy". I opened that up in a new tab and then went back to the search box and typed in "trick or treat or die The Key Of Awesome".

"What are you doing?" Max asked.

"Opening songs up on YouTube." I said as I waited for both the videos to load.

"I can see that, but what songs?" the rest of the Flock were also in the room watching what I was doing.

"I'm going to play some of the funniest songs I have ever found on the internet." I said smiling. White and Nerdy was finally fully loaded.

"_They see me mowin' my front lawn_

_I know they're thinking I'm so white and nerdy_

_Think I'm just to white and nerdy_

_Think I'm just to white and nerdy"_

The Flock crowded around my laptop to watch the video. Me and Calen sat on her bed, having seen it a million times before. Despite having heard it so many times before, we have a hard time keeping up with the words when singing along so we just stayed quiet.

"_First in my class here at M.I.T._

_Got skills, I'm a champion at D&D_

_Escher, that's my favorite M.C."_

Soon everyone was laughing as the song continued. I guess a lot of the stuff mentioned probably described the white coats at the school. I know that a lot of it describes my dad as well as a lot of his friends. The song finished and I started the next one. Everyone gathered around the laptop again to watch Trick Or Treat Or Die, a personal favorite of mine.

"_Aww yeah its Halloween mother bleepas!_

_AKA All Hallows Eve_

_Where my witches at?"_

Me and Calen started singing along to the song while the Flock just listened. I had a feeling that they would be staying up late listening to the videos posted by TKOA (The Key Of Awesome) and Weird Al.

"_Don't turn off your lights, we know your home_

_I'll beat your ass down with a Toblarone!_

_That's the Halloween code that we live our life by_

_Its not trick or treat, its trick or treat or die!_

_Trick or treat, smell my feet_

_We're the illest trick or treaters in the auto street_

_There's a joker Thanksgiving and a Christmas queen_

_But come October we're the kings of Halloween!"_

Soon it was time for bed and me and Calen decided to go to sleep while the Flock stayed up and brought the laptop to my parent's room to continue watching YouTube videos.


	8. Pancake Fails and Hanging Trees

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. **

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Eight: Pancake Fails and Hanging Trees

The next day I woke up really early to surprise everyone by cooking pancakes. Shh don't tell Dominique, she'd kill me for eating fellow pancakes. Even though the pancake mix I was going to use had hit me on the head several times whenever I open the cabinet...

Anyway, I poured the mix into a bowl and read exactly what I was suppose to pour in with it. I put in the water as well as applesauce. What? You don't use applesauce in your pancake mix instead of oil? I found out that we didn't have enough milk so I took out a can of what looked like powdered milk and poured some of that in. I got out a bag of chocolate chips (now Zainab's gonna hate me too...) to add to the pancake mix. That's when I noticed a label written on the can of powder in marker. It said "lemon drink mix".

Well so much for making pancakes.

Eventually the bird-kids, Calen, Ari, Total, and Star woke up and came down to see what I was doing.

"What is _that_?" Max asked as they all sat down at the table around my epic pancake fail.

"That, my friends, is why you should never, _ever_, let me cook." I stated simply.

"Translation, she inherited our mom's inability to cook." Calen said.

"I try to make chocolate chip pancakes, and ended up with lemon cake." I said sadly, shaking my head.

"And horrible lemon cake at that!" Iggy said, spitting out the lemon cake he had tried.

"On the bright side," I looked up happily, "we're not eating Zainab or Dominique for breakfast today!" The Flock nodded, me having told them about the desserts thing while relating the tale of the ninjas' time here.

"So what do you guys want to do today?" Calen asked, "Other than trying to catch Clarus. When we finally have some good ideas then we can work on catching her, but until then lets just have fun!" We all nodded in agreement. I know that I sometimes come up with my best ideas after having a lot of fun because then I'm able to focus more.

After Iggy had cooked breakfast and we had eaten it, I went upstairs to change our of my pj's and into clothes. I didn't notice Gazzy and Iggy plotting something on the couches. I came back downstairs to see everyone sitting down and talking. That is, almost everyone.

"Where's Gazzy and Iggy?" I asked them. I had a bad feeling about this.

"_Are you, are you_

_Comin' to the tree?_

_Where they strung up a man they say murdered three_

_Strange things did happen here no stranger would it be_

_If we met up at midnight in _

_The Hanging Tree"_

I immediately froze. That sounded like _my_ voice singing that song. I recognized it from the book Mockingjay. Its the third book in the Hunger Games Trilogy. I was so going to kill them when I found them. I started walking around the house, trying to locate them.

"_Are you, are you_

_Comin' to the tree?_

_Where the dead man called out for his love to flee_

_Strange things did happen here no stranger would it be_

_If we met up at midnight in_

_The Hanging Tree"_

Some of the Flock members were laughing by now, listening to Gazzy singing in my voice and me trying to find them. Soon we found that they weren't on the bottom floor so we all went upstairs.

"_Are you, are you_

_Comin' to the tree?_

_Where I told you to run so we'd both be free_

_Strange things did happen here no stranger would it be_

_If we met up at midnight in_

_The Hanging Tree"_

I was getting very annoyed at them now. I had kept my anger under control for most of this time, but just as the song was ending I lost my patience.

"_Are you, are you_

_Comin' to the tree?_

_Wear a necklace of rope side by side with me_

_Strange things did happen here no stranger would it be_

_If we met up at midnight in_

_The Hanging Tree"_

"I'm going to put both of you in a hanging tree you little mutts!" I yelled and sprinted after them, having finally found them. They ran upstairs onto the third floor and then out onto the roof. Gazzy and Iggy were already up in the air flying around while I was left on the ground yelling up at them.

I saw my Mockingjay book on the floor with a bookmark in it. I opened it up and saw it was marking the pages with the song on it. So that's how they knew the lyrics to the song. Throwing one last glance at the two bomb lovers, I went back in the house and put the book back on its rightful place on the bookcase on the bottom floor.

"OK everyone, TO THE ROOF!" I shouted, striking a pose pointing up at the ceiling, only to be reminded that I was the only one on the bottom floor.

Eventually we were all up on the roof and once again using Angel and Star to communicate with each other in our minds. It was almost like having eight inners arguing all at once in your head. Talk about a massive headache.

_I think we should use one of those sticky-pad-type mouse traps. All we have to do is put a sticky glue-and-gel-like substance on a piece of cardboard. Then we just have to put it in a place that she might be hiding. _I suggested.

_Yes, but she might not fall for it. She will probably be watching us and know that we put it there on purpose so we could catch her._ Star thought.

_I suggest we just wait it out. Sammie you said before that Clarus sent the ninjas back on her own when she got bored of them, so she will probably do the same thing with us eventually._ Max thought.

**Max, Clarus will not send you guys back.**

This stopped us. The voice that we all heard just now would be useless in trying to figure out who it belongs to. It didn't sound male or female, young or old, recorded or nothing. It just sounded...

Well, it just sounds like a regular voice but without all of that.

_OMG! Max I think we all just heard the Voice! Voice! Hey, Voice! Hello I'm the crazy cat lady who's been taking care of the Flock the whole time they've been here._

I think we all heard the Voice sigh at that. _Please just ignore her, its the easiest way to get along. _Calen thought.

"Meanie!" I shouted at her.

**As I was saying, Clarus will not send you all back. The Flock is her idol, the ones who showed it was in fact possible to escape the School. And if you do not find a way back, there will be no one here to save the world. Our world will end, Max.**


	9. Plots and Babysitting

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. **

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Nine: Plots and Babysitting

We all sat in silence for a bit before Star finally broke it.

_Now we all have some motivation to catching her, now don't we?_

_Oh, joy. If we don't get yo guys back to your own world your world's gonna end. Note the sarcasm._ I thought at everyone.

_All right that does it, forget about homework and studying and all that, lets focus on catching that stupid mouse that's causing all this! _Max shouted in my mind.

"Ow! To loud Max, to loud..." I said as I covered my ears, as if that would stop Max's loud shouting assault on my mind.

A wide smile suddenly snuck its way across Iggy's face. We all turned to look at him while Angel read his mind and started smiling too. Angel told us in our minds about Iggy's plan and soon everyone was smiling, even Fang. We finally had a way to catch Clarus and end all this.

"Iggy, if you don't mind I think we'll go with your plan." Calen said.

Later that day we were ready to go and execute Iggy's plan. It first involved me, Max, Fang, and Iggy going out with Panda to get her car fixed. Don't get me wrong, it really did need to be fixed, but since Clarus's interest – from what Star tells us anyway – revolves around me and the older Flock members we would be going out to lure her away from the house. Meanwhile, Ari, Gazzy, and Angel would be going swimming just in case Clarus didn't follow us. Hassan would be watching them while they swam and Nudge along with some friends that Clarus hasn't met set up the trap. Once the trap was set up it was only a matter of time before that mouse was caught.

Hassan arrived to watch the kids while they went swimming. Me and the eldest Flock members left with Panda to go get her car fixed.

"So," Panda started while we were in the car, "what exactly is the reason for you wanting to get out?"

"Oh, well there is going to be a bit of construction I guess you could say going on at home so we wanted to get out of the house. Some people are coming over to fix the tiles under one of the couches. The younger kids went swimming and Hassan is watching them. Don't worry though, we told him about the bird-kids and all before we left." I told her.

"You should have seen his reaction when he found out. He was really mad that we hadn't told him earlier." Max said. We continued talking while I silently prayed in my mind that Iggy's genius plan would work and we would soon have Clarus trapped.

XxX

Nudge waited for the friends Sammie had told her about that would be helping her to set up the trap. Max thought that Nudge should help them because of her ability to see old memories and things just by touching something. This would help determent Clarus's most frequently used hiding spots.

The friends soon arrived. And those friends used to go to school with Sammie, that is, until she changed schools. Two other people where there to help her. They didn't know about the series that she and the Flock came from, despite Sammie's attempts to get them to start reading the series. One was a boy around maybe 20 years old and the other a girl only a year older than Sammie. Wahab and Abrar walked into the house with a hamster cage, hing-like things, and other tools needed to set up the trap.

"So where do we start building this mouse trap?" Wahab asked and they soon had gotten to work on building a mouse trap worthy of the Hall of Fame for mouse traps.

XxX

Meanwhile, the younger kids where swimming in the swimming pool next to the living room. A wall with large windows in it separated the two rooms and it was a closed in pool, so even when there was a sand storm you could still go swimming if you wanted to.

Hassan sat at a small table doing homework. Gazzy was splashing around in the shallow end and Ari was attempting to get on a floaty without popping it. Angel was swimming around in the deep end. She took a small breath and let it out before diving down underneath the surface of the water.

She stayed down there for one minute...two minutes...three minutes...

By now Hassan was worried.

"Uh, Angel..." he trailed off and now she's been under the water for four minutes straight.

"ANGEL!" Hassan dove into the water, not caring that he got his clothes wet. He just wanted to save the little six year old who was drowning.

Or so he thought.

Angel waved at him under the water. Hassan just stared at her and waved hesitantly back. Angel took a deep breath of the water and Hassan pulled her back up before she drowned herself.

"What was that for?" Angel shouted.

"You were about to drown!" he shouted back at her. Angel just chuckled.

"So Sammie didn't tell you, did she?"

"Tell me what? I know you guys are part bird and some of you have weird powers, but other than that not much."

"I can read and sometimes control other people's minds. I also have gills." she said happily. Hassan just stared. "I can show you, look."

Angel dove back under the water and took a deep breath of the water and let it out through her gills. She then came back up and showed Hassan the gills before they disappeared again.

"So you can read as well as control other people's minds, have wings so you can fly, _and_ have gills so you can breath underwater?" Hassan asked amazed. Angel just nodded. "Cool!"

Hassan then looked down at his wet clothes. "So wait, I got soaking wet for _nothing_?" he shouted. Angel just laughed some more before disappearing to the bottom of the pool.

XxX

Clarus followed the elder bird-kids, Sammie, and Panda to the place where they were to get Panda's car fixed. She knew that they were all planning on a way to catch her, but at least they didn't underestimate her enough to try and catch her with those mouse traps that her idiot cousins fall for all the time.

However, having them underestimate her is what she wants. Overestimating her might involve a trap that she wouldn't be able to find where as underestimating her will result in her not being caught. Clarus wasn't going to get caught, she just couldn't. If she did then they might send her back to the School. Well, the humans from this world might. She thought that for sure Max and her Flock wouldn't.

She just really hoped that this brilliant trap of there's wouldn't catch her.


	10. Volleyball Tryouts

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. **

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Ten: Volleyball Tryouts

We came back later to find everyone sitting down on the couches. Angel, Ari, and Gazzy were dressed in clothes and using towels to dry their hair. Star and Total were fighting again, I'm not sure exactly where they have been this whole time. They tend to disappear a lot. Especially after we kept complaining about how their constant fighting was starting to get a little annoying.

Anyway, Hassan was also drying himself off with a towel and Nudge sat watching them, a smile on her face. I guess they set the trap up without any problems. Wait a second, why was Hassan soaking wet?

"Uh, Hassan why are you wet? Did you fall into the pool or something?"

"I tried to save Angel from drowning but it turns out she can breath underwater." he glared at me.

"Ops, I guess I forgot to mention that..." I rubbed the back of my head. After everyone was dried off we watched movies until it was time for bed.

The next day me and Max had volleyball try-outs after school. Several other kids were there, mostly 7th and 8th graders, but also one or two 6th graders. Rachel and Cricket – two high schoolers helping coach volleyball – stood at the front of the small gym, waiting for us to be quiet.

"All right everyone!" Rachel said, her blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail.

"We're gonna be running stairs!" Cricket said, she looked like an older version of Nudge. Soon we were all running stairs, running from the bottom floor all the way to the third floor and across the hallway onto the other side and down the stairs there and then running back to the other stairs, forming a complete circle.

"Everywhere we go people wanna know who we are so we tell them we are the falcons! The mighty mighty falcons!" some people were yelling as they ran the laps.

Another girl started a cheer too. "When I say go you say fight! Go!"

"Fight!" we all repeated, including Max. She seemed to be enjoying the tryouts.

"Go!"  
>"Fight!"<p>

"When I say maroon you say white! Maroon!"

"White!"

"Maroon!"

"White!" after that the cheers ended. That is, until I started one.

"We're number one not number two! We're gonna beat the whup! Outta you!" I said while attempting a cartwheel and only succeeding in falling flat on my butt. Don't ask how, I just did. Max helped me back up and everyone finished running laps.

Right now we were all in the small gym, practicing our over- and underhand serves. A majority of the girls there had their hair pulled back into ponytails. A few didn't need their hair pulled back because it was short enough to not get in the way. Iggy and Fang were sitting down in some plastic chairs watching and waiting for the volleyball tryouts to end.

"Come on Fang!" Iggy said, he was facing away from me and Max. "Why won't you describe what the girls look like in their volleyball uniforms?"

Most of the girls here were wearing short shorts and some were wearing tank-tops, so anyone guess why Iggy was wanting Fang to describe the girls trying out? Me and Max looked at each other before throwing our volleyballs up in the air and hitting both of them in Iggy's direction. They both bounced off the back of his head.

"Ow!" Iggy rubbed the back of his head and turned to our direction.

"Sexist pig." Max said. Come on everyone, you know he is, but we still like him anyway.

"All right everyone!" Rachel shouted. "Get over here or your going to be doing butt spells in front of all the boys!" Insert possible nose-bleed here if Iggy could still see and was really an anime/manga character instead of from a series of books. Wait, he is from a manga now. Oh, well. They all look like they are described in the books but not exactly like they do in the manga. Everyone was soon surrounding Rachel and Cricket (why do they call her that anyway? Note To Self: ask Rachel about it later).

Now they both went into a long speech about how its OK if we don't make the team and what-not, and soon we were all in a circle with our hands out ready to throw a volleyball we had there up into the air, my idea when Iggy had attempted to serve over the net and the ball instead ended up there instead of us setting it on the ground.

Rachel then proceeded to repeat one of her favorite sayings, "Remember, like my shirt says, volleyball is One Goal, One Team, One Family, One Love."

"One, two, three, OHANA!" Cricket started the counting and we all shouted the last part and attempted to throw the volleyball up in the air. Note the fact that I said attempted for instead of being thrown high into the air making this the perfect movie moment the ball decided to ruin it by instead rolling down everyone's hands and bouncing off my head. Ah, well. Me, Max, Fang, and Iggy walked away from the small gym and headed towards the Elementary field where Panda was waiting for us.

And, boy, would we be surprised when we got home.

XxX

Clarus watched the little kids from under the couch. She would have stayed to watch Sammie and Max try out for volleyball if it wasn't for that by the time she realized they weren't with them they were all in the car and on their way home.

Clarus will just have to content herself with watching the same old shows that the younger Flock members, Star, Total, Ari, Calen, and Aboss were watching. Aboss kept giving Angel chocolate and fixing tea for Calen, as well as picking out Nudge's favorite type of nuts from the bowl of them they had on a low table in front of the couches.

Girls beware when that boy gets older...

Clarus took another step closer to get a better look at the TV, and that's when the tile she was now standing on started tilting and she felt herself fall through the floor and onto something somewhat soft...

XxX

When we got home what better surprise should we get than finding a cream-colored mouse with a white belly barely able to be distinguished from her light-colored fur, blue collar with a gold tag that read #5718, and two bright green eyes – a third one closed – with pupils black as night staring up at us.

Her gaze mostly drifted to look at Max, Fang, and Iggy.

"Is this...Clarus?" I asked as I leaned in closer to look at the small mouse. Her tail with its fluffy tip rested near her feet. She was curled up in one corner of the glass hamster cage, resting her head on the soft cotton that covered the bottom of the cage. Her black nose twitched in annoyance, probably from me seeming to underestimate her so much just by looking at her.

Don't get me wrong, but I had imagined that she would probably have red fur or some other creepy features. I mean, she _is_ an experiment from the school. Sure the Flock doesn't look weird, but they were some of the less gruesome experiments from what I've read in the books. I had thought that an experiment used to see if traveling between different dimensions was possible would be one of the more gruesome-looking experiments.

That's when a small blue and white swirling portal opened up inside the cage and – before we could do anything – something came out of the portal and shattered the glass cage.


	11. Shaab Park

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. And neither do I own Shaab Park. **

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Eleven: Shaab Park

The next thing I know I'm waking up in my bed. My head hurts like hell and I think I see a few people sitting on chairs next to my bed. I can't exactly tell for sure, my visions a little fuzzy still. Eventually my vision clears and I see Calen, Aboss, and Panda sitting next to my bed.

"What happened?" I asked as I tried to sit up. My head was throbbing.

All three of them jumped a little when I spoke. Apparently they weren't expecting me to be awake yet.

"This came out of the portal Clarus had opened and it hit your head. You know, what with you having been staring right at her at the time." Panda said, holding up what looked like a... _stone_?

Well, not really a stone, more like a pebble-almost-stone sized rock. I got hit in the head with a stone and it knocked me out. Damn, I never knew that having a stone/pebble thrown at your head could hurt so much.

XxX

_In Another Dimension, on a field in the middle of a battle_

A boy about twelve years old crouched behind a boulder. He had a slingshot in his hand and a pile of pebbles and stones by him. He was waiting for his change to send one of those rocks in his slingshot at one of the generals. If he could just hit him and kill him or even knock him unconscious, the battle would be over soon.

He stood up behind the boulder and pulled back the part with the stone in it. He stared from behind where he was holding the slingshot and at his target, who was unaware – as was everyone else – of him aiming at him. Once he aimed the boy fired and he watched as the stone flew past everyone on the battle field and...

A swirling blue and white portal opened and sucked up the stone before disappearing as suddenly as it had appeared.

XxX

_Back in my world_

"How long was I out?" I asked as I set the stone down on the night stand.

"Just a few hours." Calen said.

"Where's the Flock?"

"I told them they should just find something else to do, after all there's not much room here for all of us to be in here without being squished while your on the bed."

I nodded before remembering something.

"OMGs! I just remembered that we're going to Shaab Park tomorrow!"

"OMGs?" I heard someone question from the door. I turned to see Max there looking at us.

"Oh My Gods." I told her. Blank stare. I sighed and said, "Percy Jackson series. Seriously, you all need to start reading more."

"So we are all going on a school field trip to a place called Shaab Park tomorrow?"

"Just you, me, Fang, Iggy, and all the other middle schoolers."

The next day all three of us were on a bus headed to Shaab Park, where some of the years craziest and funniest moments as well as colorful language can be found. Ah, Mr. McCurdy will you ever learn to stop cursing all the time? In class all year long that's all you ever did. Well, that and stick people's pencils to the roof of the classroom.

If he ever caught you playing with your pencil while he was talking he would throw it so it got stuck in the ceiling and you weren't aloud to have it back until it fell down on its own. I got one of my pencils stuck up there and by the end of the year it still hadn't fallen back down. I had to get an eraser and a rubber band and knock it back down.

Ah, good times, good times...

Where was I again? Oh yeah, we had all just gotten off of the buses, as you know you can't bring an entire middle school to a park on one bus, and the eldest Flock members stared at the place where they would be spending the next few hours.

"Hey manga buddy!" I heard someone shout from behind me.

"Hi Amberwing!" I greeted Zainab. "Where are Sugarstar, Littlestream, and Sagepaw?"

"Oh, that's right! Sugarstar wanted me to bring you, Softpaw, Darkpaw, and Blindpaw so we could turn them into warriors! Sagepaw too."

Soon we all were gathered around a random bench in the park so Dominique could turn all of the "apprentices" into "warriors". It may be annoying that my friends decide to make fun of my love of cats, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see what the eldest Flock member's warrior names would be.

In the end it turned out that Max's warrior name was Softheart (because of how nice she can be to people she likes), Iggy's was Blindseer (because even though he's blind its still easy to forget), and Fang's was Darkwing (Oh, the irony). Oh yeah, and Sagepaw's name was Sageleaf.

We all split up after that. Me, Max, Fang, Iggy, and Zainab off to the Evolution ride while Dominique, Holly, and Hannah went to the haunted house.

Evolution was a ride that spun you around in circles and then also brought you several feet above the ground and turns you upside down before bringing you back closer to the ground and going around and around and around like that for awhile.

"MY SHOE!" I yelled as one of my crocs fell off and hit someone on the head while we were all dangling high above several people. "SORRY!" I yelled when I saw it hit someone on the head.

Soon we were off the ride and I had both my shoes back on and me and Zainab got into a discussion about the MR series (as she had finally decided to read it) that unbenonced to me would play a very important role in sending the Flock home...

XxX

Clarus listened intently as Sammie and a person she kept calling 'Amberwing' launch into a discussion about a series of books that apparently was all their (her,the Flock, and Star)'s world was to the people here.

"Well you know the Apocalypse hasn't happened in the series yet. Well, what I've read anyway. I haven't read the most recent book, Angel. But I've read all the other six books. All the way from The Angel Experiment to Fang."

"Whaaat?" Zainab asked, confused. She thought that by Fang the Apocalypse that Max is suppose to prevent or what ever would have happened or something. She was only on the third book so Sammie was farther along than her.

"Yup, it hasn't happened yet. Although I heard that the eighth book, the one coming out after Angel, is going to be the last one."

"THE LAST BOOK IN THE SERIES? IT CAN'T END!" Zainab screamed.

"I KNOW! WHY MUST EVERYTHING GOOD COME TO AN END?" by now they both were shouting like the idiots they can both be at times.

_Its safe...to go back?_ Clarus thought. _The Apocalypse hadn't happened yet, so that means that its safe to send the Flock back! _Clarus knew that the Flock has, while greatly enjoying this world, were homesick for their own world. Now Clarus could send them back... and not have to worry about the Apocalypse for a while yet.

Smiling to herself in her hiding place her third eye opened up and suddenly it was as if the Flock had never even been in this world. _Maybe next year I can bring them back, back to one of the safest worlds out there..._


	12. Preparing For The Future

**_Author's Note:_ Due to school having started, posting chapters for the third and final part of this series is going to be hard. I already have several chapters already written for it, but once I run out of them expect updates to be slow. I'll be posting the first chapter of Dust Clouds In The Sky sometime next week hopefully.**

_**Disclaimer:**_** I don't own any of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** characters, only the OCs and even then they are based off of real people I know. **

**School Names:**

**Max – Megan**

**Fang – Daniel**

**Iggy – Ian**

Chapter Twelve: Preparing For The Future

"There was a little froggy.

He sat up on a wall.

He cheered for the other team he had no sense at all.

He fell into the water, and bumped his little head.

And when he came back up again this is what he said.

Go, go, go

Go you mighty falcons

Fight, fight, fight

Fight you mighty falcons

Win, win, win

Win you mighty falcons

Go, fight, win

Beat their faces in!"

I was currently in the middle of a volleyball match. Well, my team mates were, I was sitting on the sidelines watching them. As before, no one remembered any of the Flock's school identities. However I found out that was the work of Star, not wanting so much confusion in this world.

Star had once again disappeared, back to the MR world to report back to the white-coats, wanting to keep up the act that she was loyal to them.

Everyone else went on cheering for our team, meanwhile I was lost in thought.

Would Clarus come back? She was still on the loose, so it was possible that even if she didn't come back and annoy me again she could probably end up causing a lot of trouble for someone else.

Also if she did come back, when? Would she come back next year? The year after?

No matter, I should just focus on what is right now, not about the future. Clarus would come back from where ever she was if she wanted to.

And when she did, I would be ready for who ever – old or new – inter-dimensional travelers that would be coming to pay my world a visit once more.


End file.
